There is evidence that behavioural advice when given to puppy owners, results in fewer problem behaviours such as mouthing of people, inappropriate toileting, mounting and more importantly from a wider social perspective, aggressive behaviours towards unfamiliar dogs and people.
- Is it enough to just tell an owner to ‘socialise’ their puppy?
- Can we deliver a better set of tools to accompany this?
- Who can intervene with other learning, and how?
- What key advice needs to be given to prevent later behavioural problems?
- Specific training that assists with this puppy early learning, specifically with emotional learning.
- Why this is important for any puppy?
- How this approach fits into the pet care community especially with owners, and as early as possible
- Can we standardise practice advice, ideally in consultation with experienced trainers and behaviour professionals?
Karen Wild | Beyond socialisation: A new approach towards earliest intervention
Karen Wild, Dip App Psych, CCAB is an ASAB-Certificated Clinical Animal Behaviourist with over 20 years experience. She runs a full time behaviour practice ‘Pawprint Pets’ near Peterborough, UK, working with family dogs and cats on Veterinary referral. Karen specialises in puppy development and resource-guarding issues.
Karen is a member of the Fellow of Animal Behaviour Clinicians (FABC), a Full Member of the Association of Pet Behaviour Counsellors (APBC) and an Animal Behaviour and Training Council (ABTC) Registered Clinical Animal Behaviourist and Animal Training Instructor (ABTC-ATI). She is a Graduate Member of the British Psychological Society (MBPsS).
She has authored five books ‘What your Dog Wants’, ’21 Days to the Perfect Dog’ and ‘Being a Dog’ (Hamlyn) and co-authored two with TV Vet Emma Milne. Her goal is to communicate welfare and training issues to the wider dog-owning public. Karen was resident behaviour and training feature writer for Dogs Today magazine for over ten years and writes for national and international pet consumer and trade publications on all aspects of better pet ownership.
22nd November 2021